Tarot for Fiction Writers Course Workbook (6×9 Perfect Bound)

Description

Your deck. Your story. Fifty-five practices to turn the cards into creative fuel.

The companion workbook to the Tarot for Fiction Writers 101 self-paced course, by Jessica Arden Cline.

If you’ve ever sat down with a story problem and a blank page, you know the challenges: the character who won’t come alive, the middle that sags, ideas that feel stale. This workbook gives you a way to start moving again. Fifty-five practices, each one a concrete step you can take with a tarot card in hand. The exercises here show you how to read the cards for your story and turn them into your next scene, character, or plot turn.

The Tarot for Fiction Writers 101 Workbook is the companion to the self-paced course. It gives you room to record ideas, work through exercises, and catch whatever sparks while you watch the lessons. Take what works for you and leave what doesn’t.

Inside, the practices are designed to help you make these tarot brainstorming methods your own. Thirty-four Guided Practices let you play with each technique on a sample character or premise first. Twenty-one Independent Practices then walk you through applying it to your own work in progress.

You’ll start by getting oriented: where you are in your writing right now, why tarot works as a creative tool, and what you want from the course. From there you’ll learn the structure of the deck, map the Fool’s Journey onto a story you know, and follow the Tarot Prompting Process. Then you’ll use your cards to build characters (villains included), work with Shadow and Persona, and develop plot twists, obstacles, subplots, and mystery clues and suspects. You’ll also get unstuck when a scene stalls, choose between forking paths, craft premises for reader magnets and anthology calls, and bring in oracle decks to map growth arcs.

The workbook is available as a 6×9 paperback with a 220-page interior.

You’ll want a tarot deck and guidebook nearby (an app or online deck works too). If you’re new to tarot, Module 2 starts with the basics. If you’ve used cards for years, jump right into the practice exercises.

Pick a card, pick a practice, and see where your story goes next.

What’s inside

• Module 1: Getting Oriented. Where you are in your writing right now, why tarot works as a creative tool, and setting your intention for the course.
• Module 2: Tarot Basics, the Suits, and the Fool’s Journey. Deck orientation and structure, character and story exploration for Wands, Cups, Swords, and Pentacles, and two exercises mapping the Fool’s Journey beats onto a book or movie you know and then onto your own work.
• Module 3: The Tarot Prompting Process. A step-by-step process for taking a scene or story problem from your own project to the cards, plus prompts for choosing a deck that fits your story.
• Module 4: Visual and Traditional Interpretation. Practice reading a card by what you see, then by traditional meanings, then putting both together to fill gaps in a story.
• Module 5: Characters. Character foundations, nuance and triage, Shadow and Persona, and character arcs with the Self archetype, with exercises for villains, a cozy mystery heroine, and Shadow and Persona work.
• Module 6: Plot and Story. Five ways to develop or unstick a plot, plus exercises on plot twists, escalating obstacles, adding subplots, and building clues and a suspect list for a mystery.
• Module 7: Getting Unstuck. Sample scenarios across genres, then exercises on finding the missing piece and choosing between forking paths.
• Module 8: Crafting a Premise. Building a premise from the cards, with exercises for a new genre and for an anthology call, and a reader magnet example.
• Module 9: Oracle Cards. Using oracle decks for story premises, Shadow and Persona in dark fantasy, and mapping growth arcs.

Genres included in the guided exercises: police procedural, paranormal cozy mystery, horror, YA fantasy, LitRPG, folk horror, gothic historical romance, fairy-tale retelling, MG fantasy, mystery, sports romance, thriller, post-apocalyptic, romantasy, dark fantasy, and WWII women’s fiction, among others.